hearing that the JO may experience drastic cuts to express services starting in the 2013 budget year. money will be focused on swift and metcalf, since those are tied to federal obligations. now's the time to contact your commissioner, if you haven't already done so.

it's may, and the 650 or so transit riders who have jo monthly passes can now use them on max and other metro routes (except premium priced commuter routes).

there has been no press release yet from either the jo or the metro, but the jo has tweeted about it a few times, as has transit action network @transactionkc.

the jo does not accept metro monthly passes, not even with payment of a 50 cent (or more) fare differential. but you can still get >to< johnson county using a metro pass: ask the driver for a transfer to the jo. getting back, though, you'll have to pay the jo's cash fare of $2.00 -- not unlike poor charlie on the mta.

politically, he's right. no one should expect the current crop of commissioners to ditch JCT and pay KCATA any time soon. maybe if the county really does cut all of the commuter routes, people might get off their asses and start talking to their elected officials about the issue.

right now, it's all crickets when it comes to increasing transit funding... let alone keeping what's in place. constituents need to get louder.

pash wrote:But his entire "argument" is that you can't trust KCMO to run anything well. And that's beside the point because the KCATA is not an agency of the city of Kansas City. It's a bi-state agency whose legal service area and governance structure includes Johnson County.

it doesn't matter to them. bi-state might as well be interchanged with sex offender or illegal immigrant. it's that toxic. time for us to focus on improving the places we can make a difference (jackson county, clay county, platte county, KCMO, KCK).

pash wrote:But his entire "argument" is that you can't trust KCMO to run anything well. And that's beside the point because the KCATA is not an agency of the city of Kansas City. It's a bi-state agency whose legal service area and governance structure includes Johnson County.

I've heard people use this argument against almost anything that has to do with KCMO. Funny thing is, I can never pin them down on specific things the city doesn't do well. The best was the circular 'the fact that the city needs the e-tax is proof that it isn't run well'

If the KCMO streetcar line is successful you can bet that JoCo will try something similar. They're too conservative to do it any other way.

Just having some fun. Water main breaks are quite common in the area for many reasons.

But at least those JoCo problems don't shut down part of downtown for a day.

Anyway, from the KCMOTV website. Article "Water Main Woes". I read this first before my response above.

In mid-November, KCTV 5 filed a Missouri Open Records request with the Water Services Department for standard information about the exploding number of water main breaks. The data didn't exist and the city couldn't afford to compile it.

"We've been working with a lot less staff," Water Services Director Terry Leeds said. "We haven't had the resources to deal with that to monitor and keep track of it."

KCTV5 paid the city $850 to create the information for us – date and location of each break during the past two years as well as the cost to repair the break and the damage created by the break.

According to Leeds, Kansas City Water Services suffered more than 1,700 breaks in 2011 alone, 600 more than in an average year.

"It's been a tough year," Leeds acknowledged.

The tough times have extended into the homes of residents such as Michelle Cole. In a span of a little over seven weeks, she and her Northland neighbors have endured seven different water main breaks. Each time, Cole has scrambled to deal with the inconvenience and extra expense.

"You're spending money going out to dinner, said Cole. "You can't cook. You're wondering where the next shower is gonna come from!"

The city has yet to calculate the repair costs for the whack-a-mole like breaks traveling through Cole's neighborhood. But the data obtained by KCTV5 shows how expensive it can be to stop the spewing water and then restore streets and sidewalks to their previous states.

The average cost to repair a major water main break is $6,000. But that amount, which comes straight from your water bills, only covers the actual pipe. When you start adding in additional restoration costs, the numbers really shoot up.

"Water is a very powerful force," said Leeds. "We think about it being good to drink. That's very true, and obviously, it's what sustains our life is water. But when you put it under pressure and you have a break, you can cause damage very quickly."

For example, while the actual break at 7723 Ward Parkway cost $2,976.57 to fix, street repairs ate up another $90,236. The cost to fix the pipe at 9615 Holmes Rd was $3,616. Making this main road drivable again required another $129,266. The most expensive project in the past two years, is still going on at 10500 Wornall Rd. The data lists that pipe fix at $322. The water department shelled out a whopping $243,984 to restore the area and repave the road. But just last week, crews were back, tracking down a brand new leak.

The data reveals that in just the last two years, water main repairs and restorations have topped $10.6 million. That does not include the $1.1 million in claims paid out to residents whose homes and property have suffered additional damage. At this point, Leeds said raising rates is the only solution to this massive problem.

"We have undervalued water over the years and we're gonna pay the price for that as a city," he said.

As a result, customer bills are projected to go up 12 percent in May. The increase will raise an average $30 monthly bill by about $3.50.

While rate hikes are often unpopular, Cole says it's an investment she's ready and willing to make.

"I would be totally fine with paying more of a water bill to not have to wonder every day if I'm gonna have water or not."

The city has aging pipes. Ill constructed pipes that date to the post-World War II era help create the problem along with the city not increasing rates to pay for needed repairs.

The recent problems have been exacerbated by last year's hard winter then this summer's dry conditions. That has the earth pulling away from pipes, leading to breaks. The city has also had difficulty in recent years keeping one person in charge of the water department, delaying the creation of a water main master plan.

If you're lucky, the water main breaks in your neighborhood will stay on the city's side of the curb. The pipes under your yard and front door are just as old the ones under city streets. When they give way, you must foot the bill. It happened to Eddie Franco when a water main break filled the basement with raw sewage.

"They said you'd have to pay for it," he said.

The city has fixed the pipes it owns but says Franco must cover the cost of the pipes in the yard plus the sewage cleanup. The estimate to fix that mess was $75,000.

Leeds says the water department needs another year to create a water main master plan and determine which neighborhoods have the worst water mains and will get replacement pipe first.

In January, Bill Downey, who retired last summer as president of Kansas City Power and Light, began work as a consultant to turn the city's water services around. He is receiving $250 an hour.

Mayor Sly James addressed the city's water main issues in his budget proposal released Thursday afternoon. He said of the 1,400 breaks last year that 85 percent were fixed within 24 hours.

But he said for those who were without water for hours that "the 85 percent fixed in 24 hours is relatively meaningless" and didn't make up for the inconvenience. He said the city has 2,300 miles of water mains to maintain.

chaglang wrote:I've heard people use this argument against almost anything that has to do with KCMO. Funny thing is, I can never pin them down on specific things the city doesn't do well.

Really? I don't find that people have a hard time answering this question at all--snow removal, homicide prevention, street maintenance, park maintenance, public schools all are pretty readily mentioned.

I get very frustrated with the "KCMO can't do stuff" line of argument, but I kind of get some of it.

chaglang wrote:I've heard people use this argument against almost anything that has to do with KCMO. Funny thing is, I can never pin them down on specific things the city doesn't do well.

Really? I don't find that people have a hard time answering this question at all--snow removal, homicide prevention, street maintenance, park maintenance, public schools all are pretty readily mentioned.

I get very frustrated with the "KCMO can't do stuff" line of argument, but I kind of get some of it.

The comparison is always between KC and the JoCo suburbs, never KC to another city of its size. JoCo does a lot of things well because they have more money to play with and fewer people in poverty. I don't see the gross mismanagement that suburbanites like to allude to, but I do see the city having to spend on money on aging infrastructure and social programs that JoCo doesn't. Of course, for some over there that does constitute gross mismanagement.

i attended both public meetings. attendance was light at the morning one, but good -- maybe 30 or so actual transit riders -- at the evening one. (interestingly, there were 3 or 4 bocc members and 3 or 4 johnson county transportation council members at the evening meeting.)

i was impressed by the professionalism of the presentations by chuck ferguson and shawn strate of jct, by the amount of information in the handout they had available, and by the thoughtfulness of the people who attended to ask questions / make verbal comments.

a lot of people are talking about transit, and that has to be good.

transit action network recorded virtually the entire meeting. i expect we'll see excerpts in a few days.

Last edited by enough on Tue Jul 17, 2012 1:10 pm, edited 1 time in total.

if you haven't already done so, take a look at the 5-minute interview that janet rogers of transit action network did with henry fortunato, director of public affairs, kansas city public library. henry is transit dependent by choice and he's super articulate about the jo.